


Best kept secret

by Mczero



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Internalized Homophobia, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-15
Updated: 2019-10-15
Packaged: 2020-12-31 02:01:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21043352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mczero/pseuds/Mczero
Summary: Richie Tozier and Eddie Kaspbrak, have been together since high school and upon returning to Derry to kill what is essentially an old god, the two are more worried about their friends finding out than any space clown.





	Best kept secret

**Author's Note:**

> Author’s note: during the aids crisis partners of those who died of aids were often referred to as their “longtime companion” in obituaries.

The Jade of the Orient 

Richie and Eddie drove to Derry in separate cars, got separate rooms, and arrived at the restaurant separately, they even sat with an empty chair between them. Bill and Beverly talked about their spouses, Ben seemed ready to eviscerate Bev’s husband when he saw what he had done to her. Beverly in an attempt to change the subject turned to Eddie,  
“So, Eddie did you ever get married,” she asked, Eddie glanced at Richie,   
“No, I was always too busy to really date,” he said quickly. He and Richie had discussed what to say if a question like that came up, you don’t carry out a clandestine gay romance with your best friend for nearly 25 years without very careful planning and a lot of contingencies.   
“Yeah, way too busy, I’m sure that’s it,” Richie said, smile on his face looking just a little mischievous,   
“Fuck off man, I’m a nurse, I’m always working and if I’m not I’m asleep,”   
“Are you sure it’s not because no woman would want to go out with your asthmatic scrawny ass,” that comment brought a genuine smile to Eddie’s face, he kicked Richie under the table.   
“Don’t see you wearing a wedding ring, asshole,” he said, the others gave them a look like oh god here we go again. They didn’t hide their relationship from the other losers because they thought they wouldn’t react well, it was just that they had been keeping it a secret since they were 15, and hell 4 out of the 7 of them were kind of famous and it would only take one slip up from one of them for everything to come apart. As teenagers in the 90’s it had been easier to just hide, in college it was safer for the both of them to act like they were just roommates, and once Richie started to try a career in comedy they decided that it would be better for his prospects to maintain their secret.  
“I can’t believe I thought that not remembering the majority of my childhood was normal,” Bill laughed, Eddie and Richie stopped bickering and looked at him puzzled,  
“Yeah, remembering all of that is giving me a wicked headache,” Beverly added, Ben, Bill, and Bev talked about how strange it all was,  
“You all forgot about all of Derry?” Eddie asked tentatively,  
“You didn’t?” Mike said shocked,  
“Neither did I,” Richie said “I mean the stuff with the clown and the sewers yes, but that’s it,”  
“It can’t be that weird, you remembered Mike,” Eddie said  
“I live in Derry, Eddie how could I have forgotten it?” Mike looked like he was trying to work it out in his head but kept falling short somewhere. Richie glanced over at Eddie with worry, they couldn’t have forgotten Derry, they each took a piece of it with them. Richie took a fortune cookie and opened it. In the chaos that ensued, Eddie felt more scared than he had in years and his first instinct was to get to Richie, he moved over to him and grabbed his hand and as the creatures emerged from the cookies Richie pulled Eddie closer. 

The Derry Townhouse

They were getting out of Derry, Richie waited in the lobby only half listening to Ben’s attempts to keep him there and mostly wondering what was taking Eddie so long, he called up to him and Eddie appeared on the staircase weighed down by bags, Richie rushed up the stairs and took some of them. He tossed the bag into the trunk of his rental,   
“Richie what about my car, we can’t just leave it,” Eddie said standing nervously at the door of the hotel,  
“Eds, I’m not gonna give IT any chance to separate us, fuck the rental car I’m not losing you,” Richie walked up and grabbed Eddie’s hands  
“What are we gonna say Rich?”   
“That it got totaled or stolen or something, come on Eddie we have to get out of here,” Richie tried to pull Eddie to the car. Bill and Mike walked up the street and Eddie pulled his hands away from Richie’s. As they listened to what Bill and Mike had to say Eddie reached out a hand and twisted his and Richie’s pinky fingers together the way they had as kids when they didn’t want to get caught holding hands. They decided to stay after a lot of arguing and convincing by Beverly, Bill, and Mike it was clear that Ben didn’t want to stay but if Bev wasn’t leaving neither was he. Eddie went back up to his room, he flopped down onto the bed and lay there for an amount of time that could have been five minutes or fifty, someone knocked on his door. As soon as Eddie open the door Richie wrapped him into a hug,   
“You can’t stay Eddie, I can’t lose you, you should just get out of here, just go we can do this, but I can’t let anything happen to you, your the only thing in my life that I can’t stand to lose,” Richie’s voice was soft and full of fear and pain,   
“Rich, if you’re staying, I’m staying because it’s the same for me, I wouldn’t have stayed with you for 25 years if it wasn’t,” Eddie took Richie’s face in his hands and kissed him.   
“What are you two doing?” Bill said from the hallway, they spun around to face him, standing in the open door,   
“Shit, really, 25 fucking years and I leave a door open, fuck me, of course,” Richie said anger and shame on his face,  
“You two stayed to- together?” Bill asked  
“Yeah, we left Derry together and we just never really broke apart,” Eddie said  
“W What about,” Bill made a vague gesture that both Richie and Eddie understood perfectly, it was a gesture that said, how long have you two been you know gay with each other,   
“Since high school, since before we left,” Richie said,  
“Really,” Bill laughed “how did none of us notice,”   
“You guys were kind of dense when it came to that sort of thing, I was all over Eddie our freshman year and y’all didn’t suspect a thing,” Richie bumped Eddie’s shoulder with his own,  
“So Bill are we cool?” Eddie asked  
“Of course, I mean yeah man, hell my wife is Bi, I really don’t care, it’s 2017,” Bill said, Richie and Eddie breathed a sigh of relief. Bill started to make his way over to his room,  
“Oh and Bill, don’t mention this to the others, okay?” Eddie called after him, Bill gave them a thumbs up and walked into his room. Richie shut the door and sat down with his back to it,   
“That wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be,” he said, Eddie walked over and sat in his lap,  
“If I’m being honest I didn’t think our plan was going to work anyways,” Eddie said after a long pause, Richie smiled at him,   
“Come on Eds, I gotta get my beauty sleep,” Richie nudged Eddie to get up,  
“But you’re already Beaut-,” Richie cut Eddie off before he could finish,   
“Shut up, you’re over tired, go to sleep,” they got up off the floor and Eddie moved towards the bed, Richie went to head back to his own room.   
“Richie, stay here, don’t go,” Eddie said, Richie turned back to look at him for a second,  
“I can’t, I can’t risk another slip up,” Richie said with pain in his voice,   
“It doesn’t M-” Eddie started but Richie was out of the room. As soon as he closed the door of his own room tears started to pour down his cheeks, Richie didn’t want to hide, he didn’t want to hurt Eddie by keeping his distance but it was all he knew, they had been hiding for 2 and a half decades. Richie took off his glasses and pressed his face into the pillow, he thought of all the times that keeping their secret had hurt one of them, most notably the time that Eddie had been in a car accident and the hospital staff wouldn’t let Richie see him because they weren’t family. Richie fell asleep like that, face buried in the blankets, fully dressed, thinking about Eddie Kaspbrak.

Downtown Derry

That morning Eddie had been distant and cold to Richie, even down in the club house where they had so many happy memories together, Eddie wouldn’t look him in the eyes. He walked into the shell of what had once been the arcade, he thought about the blond boy and about Bowers calling him a fag and he just felt sad, he grabbed one of the old arcade tokens and left shaking his head. When the clown appeared on the shoulder of the statue of Paul Bunyan Richie wasn’t surprised, scared shitless sure but not surprised. The dead guy handed him a flyer, it was a funeral leaflet on it was a photo of Eddie, one Richie had taken when they were out for dinner that past winter, written under his name and the time of the service was condolences may be received by Richard Tozier, Eddie’s long time companion at-. Richie dropped the flyer and started running.

The Derry townhouse Reprise 

Eddie was sitting on a chair in the lobby with Bev and Ben, when Richie burst in. he ran over to Eddie grabbed his face in his hands and kissed him fiercely,   
“God I love you so much,” Richie said after he pulled away,   
“Excuse me, what?” Beverly said a huge smile across her face, Eddie opened his mouth to say something but Richie interrupted him,  
“Eddie and I have been together since high school, I was just too scared to tell you all,” he said,  
“I fucking knew it, right Ben? In high school I said there was something going on there,” Beverly practically shouted,  
“Yeah, I remember that actually,” Ben added, Eddie pushed Richie out of the way, so he could stand, he grabbed Richie’s wrist,  
“Richie come with me,” Eddie pulled him out of the room,  
“Shit, Eds did I fuck up, I’m sorry I should have discussed it with you first,” as soon as Richie finished talking Eddie was kissing him, he had Richie pinned against the wall which was almost comical because of their height difference, he had his hands on Richie’s shoulders and Richie had his around Eddie’s back.   
“You are such a fucking asshole,” Eddie said,  
“Thanks,” Richie replied   
“I can’t believe you of all people made a grand gesture of love,” Eddie smiled up at him,   
“Why did you snatch me into another room then? I was sure that I was getting a lecture.” Richie asked pushing a hand into Eddie’s hair.  
“I didn’t want to scandalize Ben,” Eddie replied, Richie laughed  
“How do you think we should tell Mikey boy?” he laughed  
“Well it has to involve us making out in front of him, it’s only fair, it’s what the others got” Eddie tracked a slow circle on the back of Richie’s neck. There was a scream from the lobby and Richie and Eddie ran to see what was happening. Henry Bowers stood at the top of the stairs, knife in hand and wild look in his eyes, Ben held an umbrella from the holder at the door like it was a sword. Bowers charge forward down the stairs, Richie stuck his arm in between the slats and into his path, Bowers pitched forward and tumbled down the stairs.   
“Ow Fuck, my fucking arm,” Richie shouted pulling his arm back, Ben slammed the handle of the umbrella onto the back of Henry’s head. The part of Richie’s arm that had been in between the bars was bent at a weird angle and it was starting to bruise.   
“Is it broken?” Bev asked her voice shaking, Ben glanced over but then trained his eyes back on Bowers in case he started to wake up.   
“No,” Richie said  
“Yes,” Eddie said, “It doesn't look too bad but yeah, it’s definitely broken,” Eddie reached out and touched Richie’s arm, he flinched back, Eddie took his arm in his hands and Richie’s eyes went wide,   
“Eddie, don’t I swear to,” Richie finished the sentence with a peel of screams as Eddie snapped the bone back into place. Bowers shifted and Ben whacked him again. 

Down in the sewers

Eddie wrapped Richie’s arm up in an ace bandage and made a makeshift sling out of a towel,   
“Richie you cannot go into the sewers, like that,” Eddie said as they stood in front of the neibolt house “as a medical professional I can’t allow it,”  
“Eddie, I love you but you’re only a nurse and I can do what I want,” Richie tried to smile at him but faltered when he saw the look on Eddie’s face. Instead he took Eddie’s hand in his good one, “let’s kill this fucking clown, again,” he said. When the ritual didn’t work out they ran, Richie and Eddie being sure to stay close to each other, they hadn’t expected to see a Pomeranian behind the not scary at all door and they had been even more shocked when it had transformed into a horrific monster. The pair were completely fed up with IT, Eddie screamed when the dead lights took Richie and he impaled IT with the iron dowel, IT swung it’s claw at Eddie, Richie rolled them out of it’s path. They stood together hand in hand screaming insults at the clown until it shriveled into nothing. As soon as they were outside, Richie collapsed to the ground,  
“Think I broke my arm,” he said,  
“Yeah, we know,” Eddie said ,  
“No I mean more,” Richie lifted the arm which was bent at a severe angle   
“I knew this would happen, you dumbass,” Eddie shook his head,  
“Hey, Eds I think we should get married,” Richie said, flopping his arm back down  
“What?” Eddie said  
“What?” Mike said confused,  
“Did you two really forget to tell Mike?” Beverly laughed 

The Merrill auditorium, Portland Maine

An usher led Eddie to his seat in the front row, Bev, Ben, and Mike were already seated, they watched camera men rush around setting up and excited audience members filing in, Bill and his wife Audra sat down just as the lights dimmed and the curtain opened. There was Richie, waving at the crowd and smiling, he wore a pair of blue jeans and a grey t-shirt with a huge black fly and the caption Maine state bird, on it. The crowd settled and Richie grabbed the mic,  
“Ya know going home after a while can be tough, seeing your parents again, meeting up with old friends, fighting a murderous clown from the dawn of time, telling all your childhood best friends that you’ve been in a secret gay relationship for 25 years, proposing to the guy you’ve been dating since high school, and seeing that all the places you used to hang out are closed,” Richie said seemingly all in one breath, the crowd screamed people whistled and cheered, “I know, I know I’ve even got receipts, you fuckers” Richie waved his engagement ring at the audience, “y’all are so excited about me getting gay married that you just blew right past the clown thing huh, to be fair, it is much less important but anyways I bet you guys are wondering what happened to my arm,” he gestured to the cast “well it was that goddamn clown,” Richie recounted a much funnier version of the story of them killing the clown. The crowd ate it up, for it being the first full set that Richie had written completely solo it was fantastic.   
“Alright folks that’s about it, I can see the hook getting ready to pull me off the stage, I just wanted to say thank you, to all of you of course and the losers club, Eddie, Bill, Bev, Ben, Mike and Stan, miss you buddy,” as Richie said Stan’s name he touched his fingers to his lips and pointed them up to the sky,   
“Goodnight and welcome to the losers club assholes!”


End file.
